Routes people actually took.

Germany's president touched down in Hefei before dawn - not Beijing. Five days: a Qing-dynasty statesman's mansion, a city park built on the old airport, Volkswagen's biggest R&D center outside Germany (he rode in its China-built smart EV), then the UNESCO village of Hongcun and the Yellow Mountains before the Beijing banquet circuit. The Anhui leg is the copyable part, and almost nobody outside China noticed.

Two weeks, five cities, one book tour. She came to sign books and stayed for the gardens — Canton Tower at dusk, a quiet temple morning in Xiamen, face-changing opera in Chengdu, then Suzhou's gardens before the Oriental Pearl finale.

The family's China week, minus the film crew: the zoo and Disneyland in Shanghai with the kids, then north to walk the Wall in qipao above Beijing. Short, photogenic, very copyable.

A chancellor doing a street walk: a hydrogen plant in the morning, then the Chongqing stroll from Kuixinglou to Jiefangbei that every travel feed replayed. Students at Tongji the next day, Beijing to close.

China through a supply-chain lens: a dawn walk on the Bund, shengjian buns for breakfast, a flagship opening in Jing'an — then Chengdu, where the game studios are. Two cities that build the phone in your pocket.

The new chancellor's first China run was half diplomacy, half factory floor: Beijing handshakes, then Hangzhou — where the headline stop was Unitree's humanoid robots, the clip that went everywhere. Scholz walked Chongqing's streets in 2024; Merz came to see the machines.

The Classic First Trip: capital first for the Wall and the Forbidden City, the Terracotta Warriors in the middle, Shanghai's skyline to finish. Six days, zero backtracking.

Culture & Heritage: Beijing and Xi'an at full depth, then Nanjing — the Ming tomb and the great city wall the textbooks skip. Seven days of dynasties, in order.

High-Tech China: EV Shanghai, campus Beijing, mountain-future Chongqing. Elon Musk's own China stops were all meetings and a factory floor tourists cannot enter — so this is the version you can actually take.

The Foodie Trail: morning tea in Guangzhou, hotpot diplomacy in Chengdu and Chongqing. Three cities, one rule — never schedule anything important after lunch.

The walk that made a chancellor go viral is still the best hour in Chongqing: start on a square that is secretly the 22nd floor, drop past the city's living-room monument, and end in a Song-dynasty temple wedged between towers.

Shanghai's whole argument in one walk: the colonial waterfront, the neon shopping canyon, then a golden temple wrapped around a metro station — the same arc Tim Cook took at dawn, minus the ribbon-cutting.

Suzhou's oldest street still does its original job: a canal on one side, whitewashed lanes on the other, teahouses where the regulars predate the republic. Walk it end to end, then detour to the twin pagodas leaning over a quiet market street.

Family First: Shanghai's zoo and Disneyland while energy is high, the Wall on a weekday morning, and nap-shaped gaps everywhere. Five days, two cities, zero meltdowns scheduled.

Old Towns, Slowly: Suzhou's lanes and gardens, Hangzhou's lake at walking speed, Nanjing's old south city to finish. Six days at the pace these places were built for.

China After Dark: Shanghai's neon canyons and Chongqing's cliff-side night maze, with dinner as the main event in both. Sleep in — this route starts at six.

The Grand Tour: three days in the capital, the Warriors, pandas and hotpot, and a Shanghai finish. Ten days, four cities — the full first-timer's loop with room to breathe.